Confused yet? | Opinion | dailyitem.com – Sunbury Daily Item

Tax cuts good, tax cuts bad! Deficits good, deficits bad! National debt needs limits, limits are bad. What do you think? The latter is a real question.

I like to watch YouTube videos on physics, like Quantum Theory. I have to admit, I have no idea what it means. Worse, the explanations create such dissonance I want to stop listening.

Are taxes and deficits complicated? You bet. Are they so complicated that we cant understand them? I dont think so. They are not physics. But listening to our political discourse would make you think so. We should not stop listening, we need to learn.

Do we hear the Brits, the French, the Germans, the Japanese wrangling over taxes, debt and deficits? Not like us. The Japanese have the highest debt to GDP ratio in the world, about 250%. Ours is about 120%. They all borrow at lower rates and lend us money! How can they do that?

They live in the real world. Their citizens remember the pain. The worlds financial markets exert real discipline on them. If they were irresponsible, they would have to pay outrageous interest rates. In the 1920s, after WWI, the Deutschmark was valued at over 4 trillion to the dollar. So things do change and people learn. The Republicans repudiating the debts they ran up to cut taxes for the wealthy is irresponsible to me. Have we learned?

Its not physics, its politics: Who gets what, when and how? While it is not the household budget, reasonable people can, and do, figure it out. The problem is that the Congress cannot agree on purpose: what and whom, like tax cuts for the 1% to borrow and tax for. That is their most important job!! But they avoid it to get reelected.

If you disagree, just ask yourself: how much time does our congressman, Fred Keller, spend trying to explain his thinking, or asking yours, on these issues instead of ranting about vaccinations? Does he help you decide what is right, or is he working for someone that he doesnt talk about. In my opinion, he likes that we are confused.

Joe Pugliese,

Lewisburg

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Confused yet? | Opinion | dailyitem.com - Sunbury Daily Item